Middle East

Mar. 17, 2014 | 12:09 AM

Islamists outwitting Egypt army in Sinai

File - Boys look at a burnt area around a house after assaults on militant targets by the Egyptian Army, in a village on the outskirts of Sheikh Zuweid, near the city of El-Arish in Egypt's Sinai peninsula in this September 10, 2013. (REUTERS/Stringer)

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Egypt's army says it is crushing Islamist militants in the Sinai Peninsula, but in the region's villages and towns, a victory for the state feels a long way off.

In a rare visit to eight villages in the northern Sinai last week, a Reuters reporter saw widespread destruction caused by army operations but also found evidence that a few hundred militants are successfully playing a cat-and-mouse game with the Arab world's biggest army and are nowhere near defeat.

Sinai-based militants stepped up attacks on police and soldiers last year, soon after Egypt's army toppled Islamist President Mohammad Morsi.

Every day at 4 p.m. the army closes the main streets in every village.

A military officer at a checkpoint in Al-Masoura village said the army only attacked villages that were occupied by militants.

Sheikh Hasan Khalaf, who heads the Sawarka tribe in Sinai, said 35 residents who gave the army information on militants had been shot dead in the past three months.